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103 Propaganda Essay Topics & Examples

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🏆 Best Propaganda Topic Ideas

🔊 excellent propaganda essay examples, 👍 good propaganda essay topics, ❓ questions about propaganda.

In your propaganda essay, you might want to focus on the historical or ethical aspects of the issue. Another interesting option would be to focus on a particular case and discuss the effectiveness of propaganda. In this article, we’ve gathered a list of top propaganda topics to write about. They will suit for essays, research papers, speeches or other projects. We’ve also added some excellent propaganda essay examples to inspire you even more.

• Persuasion and Propaganda: Differences and Similarities In contrast to propaganda, persuasion is characterized by private acceptance of the position advocated in the message. In contrast to persuasion, propaganda is based on mind control aimed to condemn the recipients of a particular […]
• World War II Propaganda Posters in America The imagery of the boot stepping on the American church is not just a threat to the religious ideals of the country but a threat to freedom itself as the church often doubled as the […]
• Propaganda During World War II The Second World War was a complicated time for both the general public and the authorities since while the former worried for their safety, family, and homeland, the latter needed to maintain the national spirit […]
• Hitler’s Use of Propaganda and Fear-Mongering The establishment of the National Socialist German Worker’s Party led to the adoption of a properly coordinated propaganda campaign that would prepare the country for war.
• Political Propaganda in The Aeneid by Virgil As the paper reveals, The Aeneid is a political epic that was written with a political agenda to justify the founding of the nation of Rome.
• Propaganda Techniques in Advertising The end goal is to solidify the brand in the subconscious mind of the buyers, in order for it to be able to compete with other brands.
• Propaganda Techniques in the Vitaminwater Advertisement Applying this technique implies that an advertisement uses strong, attractive words and phrases to show how good a product is in order to attract the audience’s attention.
• French Revolution: Role of Propaganda and Music The history of propaganda is based on three interweaving fundamentals: first, the mounting need, with the growth of civilization and the rise of nation-state, to win the battle for people’s minds; second, the increasing sophistication […]
• Propaganda in “Animal Farm” by George Orwell His greatest objective is to carry out the spreading of the revolution and to bring in the improvement of the general welfare of all the animals on the farm.
• Stereotypes and Propaganda in Society Analysis The unfortunate reality is that the propaganda onslaught is continuous and the gullibility of the audience is also too often and thus the thinking of the majority of the audience is corrupted on heavy scales.
• Rhetoric and Propaganda: How Far Is Rhetoric From Propaganda? In order to understand the essence of the two terms, it is important to consider the available definitions and meanings assigned to rhetoric and propaganda in the modern world.
• World War II Propaganda and Its Effects The purpose of this paper is to examine the confrontation between the German and the Soviet propaganda machines during the period of the Second Patriotic War, outline the goals and purposes of each, and identify […]
• Anti-War Movement DADA Vs. Propaganda Posters of WWI In relation to the causes of the WWI, these can considered as pertinent specifically on the basis that the reasons can be related to the type of society that is present during the said era.
• The World War II Propaganda Techniques All the parties to the war, including Germany, the Soviet Union, and Britain, invested many resources in propaganda, but the present essay will focus on the United States’ effort. Furthermore, propaganda messages were created to […]
• The History of Propaganda: From the Ancient Times to Nowadays The history of propaganda shows that some means of encouraging the troops, or discouraging the enemy were undertaken in the ancient times, and the times have preserved and brought up the names of the greatest […]
• Propaganda in the Democratic Society The article focuses on the effects of propaganda on the democracy. In the article, he focuses on his experiences in the media industry with respect to the past and the present news.
• The Use of Propaganda in Political Campaigns The issue of propaganda is of current importance because we hear such words we can face propaganda in every sphere of human life: political campaigns, propaganda of healthy way of life, propaganda in the sphere […]
• Propaganda, Persuasion and Public Relations For example in the case of the Australia’s cancellation of the Fuel Watch program Senator Xenaphon utilized propaganda stating that Fuel Watch was not an effective means of helping consumers stating the need to tackle […]
• How to Control What People Do: “Propaganda” by Edward Bernays In the book, Bernays explains how he employed propaganda to manipulate the public when he was the head of the United States Department of public information during world war I.
• “The Motherland Calls”: Art as Political Propaganda The statue is meant to commemorate the Soviet victory in the Second World War, represent the soviet might, and serve as a message to all enemies of the USSR.
• Contribution of Media Text to World Wars’ Propaganda The key stakeholders in the industry prioritized profit maximization, hence amplifying the benefits of winning the war while minimally addressing the repercussions of the violence to the international community.
• Freedom of Speech and Propaganda in School Setting One of the practical solutions to the problem is the development and implementation of a comprehensive policy for balanced free speech in the classroom.
• The Role of Propaganda During World War II The poster encourages men to enroll in the army to protect the peaceful lives of women and children. By manipulating emotions and feelings, propaganda influenced people to enroll in the army or work harder.
• Nazi Propaganda and Triumph of the Will Based on this, the filming of the Triumph of the Will took place with the help of the vision of the world and the situation by the directors, omitting a number of significant events or […]
• Basic Propaganda Techniques The majority of the article is dedicated to Logos, however, presenting logical arguments and examples. When examples of negativity can be largely attributed only to one side, the folly occurs as follows: Subject A is […]
• Jim Crow Era Signage and Advertisements: Tools for Reinforcement a Racist Propaganda The quality of the services offered to “colored” people, It comes as no surprise, that all public facilities and spaces were segregated, particularly in the Southern states.
• The Use of Radio in German Propaganda During the World War II One of the techniques used by the Nazis to persuade German people and shape their worldview was the use of such media as radio.
• War on Terror: Propaganda and Freedom of the Press in the US There was the launching of the “Center for Media and Democracy”, CMD, in the year 1993 in order to create what was the only public interest at that period. There was expansive use of propaganda […]
• Medieval and Renaissance Art Religious Style and Propaganda The main task of these artworks was to inspire and awe the people, to show the greatness and almightiness of God.
• Is Propaganda a Technique or a Phenomenon? The main goal of this paper is to analyze the nature of propaganda to answer the question of whether it is a phenomenon or a technique.
• World War I: Medias of Propaganda in the U.S. Posters of World War 1 presented a different style of propaganda because of the war time effort of U S government.
• Commercial Advertisements as a Form of Propaganda System This is due to the fact that the objective of advertisement is to promote a product or service resulting in a financial benefit to the firm.
• Commercial Advertising as a Propaganda System The propaganda system is a commonly used tool of winning the attention of the audience and is mostly used in political circles although it has of late gained popularity in the business environment.
• Anti-Japanese Propaganda During World War II The content of propaganda was much the same as that of broadcast propaganda: emphasis on the Allies’ growing war potential, ridicule of the more preposterous assertions of the National Socialists, evidence of self-contradictions in the […]
• Propaganda in Art During the Second World War In the background of the Great Depression, and the Second World War this poster was the embodiment of the unification of generations, which takes place at the feast table.”The Four Freedoms” speech, proclaimed by Roosevelt […]
• Persuasion and Propaganda in Modern Society Persuasion is based on discourse and dialogue; propaganda is intended to be one-sided” Some researchers, such as Cain, look at any piece of media communication according to the ten points identified by Jowett and O’Donnell […]
• Nazi’s Propaganda in the XX Century At first, Nazis used propaganda technologies to draw attention of other political organizations of the right wing, then, after the departure of imprisonment by Hitler, the party becomes better organized and, finally, propaganda is used […]
• Post-World War II Propaganda Art According to Arendt, the “who” is revealed in the narratives people tell of themselves and others. We humanize what is going on in the world and in ourselves only by speaking of it, and in […]
• The Power of Propaganda He is of the opinion that lies comprise the lion’s share of propaganda and describes it as a very powerful tool utilized in the arena of politics.
• Bolshevik Propaganda in the Russian Revolution Communists hoped to achieve, and that was why they had more and more concentrated their propaganda efforts on the boys and girls and the young men and women.
• Propaganda Theory Analysis Communication Theory Propaganda Theory Meaning The propaganda theory explains how social, political, and economic attitudes are manufactured to manipulate the populace, for the sake of the welfare of entities with power and money. Invention Edward S. Herman and Noam Chomsky introduced the theory in their book, Manufacturing Consent – The Political Economy of the Mass […]
• Albert Speer’s Architectural Scale as a Tool of Nazi Propaganda In the center of attention of Hitler, there was the restructuring of Berlin by the architect Albert Speer. Such buildings as the Volkshalle and the Cathedral of Light were the most expressive projects that illustrated […]
• Propaganda and Political Framing The video chosen for the overview in this paper is called “Euromaidan/Kijow 2014”, it was posted on YouTube by a user under the nickname MrMitos1 in the end of February this year, which was the […]
• Propaganda of Social Movements and Non-State Actors Taking a closer and more attentive look at the FARC video, it is easy to notice that the cartoon characters are of Latin origin, the video is designed to attract the people of Colombia and […]
• Terrorism as Spectacle: Extremist Propaganda The objective of terrorist propaganda is to influence the attitude of a specified mass audience. Terrorist propaganda in the video links is intended to publicize acts of brutality committed by the militants.
• Advertising: Rhetoric or Propaganda? The shorter video mainly features the executive director of the “Morningside Recovery” company, who might be described as an attractive person, which creates additional appeal in the viewers of the video; the director briefly outlines […]
• Propaganda: “Total” and “Time” Concepts The fact that the most outrageous instances of propaganda are never forgotten and stay in history brings us to the next aspect of the investigated phenomenon and technique, which is the “Time”.
• The Cyberspace War: Propaganda and Trolling To justify the theory that will be used in the study, it is necessary to state that the Russian government has been using the workforce of its employees to change people’s opinions to the ones […]
• American Government: Propaganda and Persuasion He successfully achieved his goal of sending a man to the Moon and managed to beat the Soviet Union mostly due to his ability to capture people’s imagination.
• Islamic State of Iraq and Syria and Its Propaganda The Middle East also has a serious economic impact on the rest of the world because of the rich oil deposits, especially in the countries bordering the Persian Gulf.
• Holocaust, Antisemitism, and Propaganda That is why, nowadays great attention is given to issues which led to the death of millions of people. Being a part of the ideology of Nazism, it led to the elimination of a great […]
• Authoritarian Propaganda in Education and Media The question that people often ask themselves is, ‘how do authoritarian regimes get away with violence, torture, and oppression?’ Most of the citizens in countries led by authoritarians often seem to be in agreement with […]
• Islamic State’s Online Propaganda to Men and Women The third hypothesis is that the ISIS extensively uses misrepresentation as a tool of online communication, i.e.the way the role and position of women in the ISIS presented in the terrorists’ online communication are significantly […]
• Propaganda as a Social Phenomenon Edgar Henderson, also comprehensively in propaganda scholarship, argues that propaganda is basically a social phenomenon owing to its objectivity and capacity to appeal to the psychological or sociopsychological dispositions of individuals.
• Propaganda: Terrorist, Government, State, Non-State Extremists pass their terrorist propaganda to the youth through the power of the media and the internet. Ideally, propaganda that is produced by the state aims at influencing the opinions and attitudes of its people […]
• Terrorist and Government Propaganda in Media The aim of terrorists, especially those concerned with religious extremism, is to attract the attention of the state and other members of the public.
• Propaganda and Marketing Relationships This aspect was meant to prevent the wrong societal perceptions that Bernays was promoting Venida products in the market, but showing the public the importance of the hairnets.
• Propaganda of Adolf Hitler and Jim Jones This is a scenario that has occurred with the Nazi, under the command of Adolf Hitler, and the story of Jim Jones, and the people who followed him in a quest to build an ideal […]
• Propaganda Techniques in Movies: Light, Camera, Action Despite using rather simplistic propaganda techniques and devices, such as Beautiful People and Flag-Waving, the movie manages to get the key idea of the major flaws at the very core of the current healthcare system […]
• Propaganda Forms and Techniques They both target the anti-government group that is most likely to criticize and question the actions of the government. The policies of the government have been hijacked and are now in favor of the ruling […]
• Propaganda Model and Media Power The media is expected to expose any practices of the government and corporate bodies that may cause any harm to the public in one way or the other.
• Propaganda Movement in Mass Media Through the study of Gimenez et al, it was seen that the correlation between the propaganda model and the power of the media can be summarized on the impact of irrational exuberance as a means […]
• Influence of Propaganda Politics The organizers of the event were well conversant with the impact of the flag to the message; it created credibility and believability among the members of the public.
• The Marlboro Ads as a Propaganda Advertising As such, the target of information presented is to alter the attitudes of consumers towards the interests of the advert sponsors.
• Propaganda as Hezbollah’s Auxiliary Strategy These strategies include the construction of a propaganda theme park, the establishment of a Hezbollah television station, the development of anti-Israeli video games, and the production of varied merchandise that promote Hezbollah’s ideas and values.
• Why We Fight: American Wartime Propaganda The reason for this is simple contrary to what it is being suggested in the film, the overwhelming majority of German Nazis, as well as ordinary German citizens who never ceased supporting Nazis right to […]
• Propaganda in Pro-slavery Arguments and Douglass’s Narrative Propaganda refers to the form of communication that is meant to influence the feelings and attitudes of individual to believe or support a certain viewpoint.
• Propaganda Model: Herman and Noam Chomsky In Chomsky’s opinion, the conclusion that the tyranny of the majority can threaten the rights of persons, including the rights for freedom of speech and conscience, was the result of confusion caused by the vague […]
• Al Jazeera TV: A Propaganda Platform Al Jazeera is the largest media outlet in the Middle East reporting events mostly to the Arab world. The media outlet has equated revolutions in Egypt and Libya with the ejection of totalitarianism in the […]
• History of Hitler’s Nazi Propaganda According to Hitler, the German’s defeat in the First World War, the Bolshevik Revolution, German’s post war inflation, and the economic crisis of the year 1929 were accredited to International Jewry. Over time, the masses […]
• Media Propaganda: Poster Advertisement Further, at the lower right corner, the poster has a picture of the spray under consideration and the name of the spray: “New Axe Essence”.
• Propaganda and Mass Media: Obstacles and Best Conditions for Propagandist The first obstacle is to comprehensively understand the nature of the target audience that the propagandist wants to modify through the use of propaganda.
• Propaganda in the “Triumph of the Will” This is propaganda because the development of Germany was not based on the efforts of the labor force alone, but also on all German citizens and the world at large. He is often heard saying […]
• What American Leader Relies on Propaganda and Appeals to Fear?
• How Did Hitler Consolidate His Power and Continue to Gain Support Using Propaganda?
• How Is Propaganda Used?
• How Effective Were Indoctrination and Propaganda?
• Did a Campaign of Propaganda and Disinformation Initiate the War in Iraq?
• How Did the Nazi Regime Use Propaganda as a Form of Political Control?
• What Makes a Good Propaganda?
• How Media and Propaganda Are Related?
• How Did the Nazi Party Use Propaganda?
• How Were Cartoons and Propaganda Used Against Jews and Nazis During World War II?
• How Did Propaganda Help the Nazis Control?
• What Role Did Printed Propaganda Play in the Outbreak and Continuation of Conflict During the Wars of the Three Kingdoms?
• How the Nazi Germans Used the Media to Spread Propaganda During Hitler’s Time?
• How Does Napoleon Use Persuasive Language and Propaganda to Seize and Maintain Power?
• Was Propaganda the Main Reason for the Lack of Opposition to the Nazis?
• How Have Images and Designs Been Used as Social Protest and Propaganda?
• How Effective Was Propaganda in Affecting the Way People Acted and Thought?
• Why Did the British Government Make Use of Propaganda During World War I?
• How Successful Was Propaganda in Indoctrinating Nazi Ideals?
• How Did Radio and Movies Change People’s Ideas, and How Were They Used for Spreading Propaganda?
• What Are Propaganda Historical Origins?
• What Is Propaganda in Psychology?
• How Propaganda Helped the Nazi Government to Control Germany?
• How Far Did Ancient Coinage Serve as a Medium for Political Propaganda?
• What Is Bandwagon in Propaganda?
• Why the Society Has to Co-exist With Propaganda?
• How Vital Was Propaganda to Nazi Control Over Germany in 1934-1939?
• How Important Was the Governments Use of Propaganda in Bringing the Strike to an Early End?
• How and Why Did the Nazis Use Propaganda to Further Their Aims 1929-1933?
• How Does Propaganda Work?
• Chicago (A-D)
• Chicago (N-B)

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By Eric Brahm

August 2006  

The term propaganda has a nearly universally negative connotation. Walter Lippmann described it as inherently "deceptive" and therefore evil.[1] Propaganda is more an exercise of deception rather than persuasion. Partisans often use the label to dismiss any claims made by their opponents while at the same time professing to never employ propaganda themselves. It is akin to advertising and public relations, but with political purpose. Although propaganda has been utilized for centuries, the term was first used in 1622 when Pope Gregory XV issued the Sacra Congregatio de Propaganda Fide to counter the growing Protestant threat in order "to reconquer by spiritual arms" those areas "lost to the Church in the debacle of the sixteenth century."[2] Propaganda has become a common element of politics and war. As new communications technologies have developed, propagandists have developed new methods to reach increasingly large audiences in order to shape their views. The shift to targeting mass audiences and not just elite publics has been called by some as "new propaganda."[3] This essay aims to provide a brief overview of the concept of propaganda, various propaganda techniques, and related topics.

In a nutshell, propaganda is designed to manipulate others' beliefs and induce action in the interest of the propagator by drilling the message into the listeners' heads. It involves the use of images, slogans and symbols to play on prejudices and emotions. The ultimate goal of propaganda is to entice the recipient of the message to come to 'voluntarily' accept the propagandist's position as if it was one's own. Propaganda may be aimed at one's own people or at members of other groups. It can be designed to agitate the population or to pacify it. We often think of propaganda as false information that is meant to reassure those who already believe. Believing what is false can create cognitive dissonance, which people are eager to eliminate. Therefore, propaganda is often directed at those who are already sympathetic to the message in order to help overcome this discomfort. One the one hand, then, propaganda generally aims to construct the self as a noble, strong persona to which individuals in the domestic population can feel connected. At the same time, propaganda often attempts to rally the domestic public to action creating fear, confusion, and hatred by portraying the antagonist as an abominable figure.[4] Typically, the Other is demonized or dehumanized.[5] Stereotyping and scapegoating are common tactics in this regard. At its most extreme, propaganda is intended to overcome a reluctance to kill. In its modern usage, propaganda also tends to be characterized by some degree of institutionalization, mass distribution, and repetition of the message. [6]

Propagandists often conceal their purpose, even their identity, in order to distract the public. White propaganda, for instance, is from a correctly identified source and is not intentionally deceptive. Black propaganda, by contrast, is purposefully deceptive in giving the impression that the source is friendly.[7] Finally, the term gray propaganda has been used to describe propaganda that falls somewhere in between.

Although the range of propaganda techniques is seemingly limitless, space permits only an abbreviated discussion.[8] One common technique is bandwagoning, in other words appealing to people's desire to belong especially to the winning side, rather than the rightness of the position. Doublespeak involves the use of language that is deliberately constructed to disguise or distort its actual meaning. Examples might include downsizing, extraordinary rendition, or the coalition of the willing. These may take the form of euphemisms, which are used to make something sound better than it is such as the term collateral damage. Another strategy is to appeal to authority. For instance, the World War II-era series This is War! emphasized how FDR's leadership qualities were similar to greats like George Washington and Abraham Lincoln.[9] At other times, testimonials may be effective. Propaganda is also often heavily laced with rationalization and oversimplification. On the latter point, glittering generalities are words that, while they may have different positive meaning for individual, are linked to concepts that are highly valued by the group. Therefore, when these words are invoked, they demand approval without thinking, simply because such an important concept is involved. For example, when a person is asked to do something in 'defense of democracy' they are more likely to agree. The concept of democracy has a positive connotation to them because it is linked to a concept that they value. Propagandists sometimes use simple name-calling to draw a vague equivalence between a concept and a person, group, or idea. At other times, they may use "plain folks rhetoric" in order to convince the audience that they, and their ideas, are "of the people." Finally, propaganda often tries to at least implicitly gain the approval of respected and revered social institutions such as church or nation in order to transfer its authority and prestige to the propagandist's program.

Overall, many have pointed out that the most effective propaganda campaigns rely heavily on selective truth-telling, the confusion of means and ends, and the presentation of a simple idyllic vision that glosses over uncomfortable realities.[10] Psychologists Pratkanis and Aronson recommend four strategies for a successful propaganda campaign.[11] The first point is the importance of pre-persuasion. The propagandist should attempt to create a climate in which the message is more likely to be believed. Second is the credibility of the source. He/she should be a likable or authoritative communicator. Third, the message should be focused on simple, achievable goals. Finally, the message should arouse the emotions of the recipient and provide a targeted response.

It is unclear whether technological developments are making propaganda efforts easier or not. On the one hand, advances in communications technologies may be reducing government control over information.[12] Through the internet and satellite television, people need no longer rely solely on their governments for information. On the other hand, technology may make propaganda more effective. For example, it can make the experience of war more superficial and distort the lessons of prior conflict.[13] In addition, one can get overwhelmed with the amount of information on the internet, making it difficult to determine whether a particular source is credible. What is more, there appears to be significant 'virtual Balkanization' in which like-minded individuals form closed communities in which other viewpoints are not sought after.

Whether for scholars or the average person, Jowett and O'Donnell offer a 10 point checklist for analyzing propaganda:[14]

• The ideology and purpose of the propaganda campaign,
• The context in which the campaign occurs (for example, history or the ideological and social mileu),
• Identification of the propagandist,
• The structure of the propaganda organization (for example, identifying the leadership, organizational goals, and the form of media utilized),
• The target audience,
• Media utilization techniques,
• Special techniques to maximize effect (which include creating resonance with the audience, establishing the credibility of the source, using opinion leaders, using face-to-face contact, drawing upon group norms, using rewards and punishment, employing visual symbols of power, language usage, music usage, and arousing emotions),
• Audience reaction to various techniques,
• Counterpropaganda (if present),
• Effects and evaluation.

Psychological Operations (PSYOPs)

PSYOPs are a military tactic that also involves the use of propaganda. Rather than build support amongst one's citizenry, the goal is to demoralize one's opponent and create confusion. Since World War II, most wars have seen the creation of radio stations that broadcast music and news meant to hurt morale of the opposition. Dropping leaflets over enemy lines and even amongst the civilian population of one's opponents is also common. These techniques are designed to promote dissension and defections from enemy combat units as well as emboldening dissident groups within the country. PSYOPs can also provide cover and deception for one's own operations. Finally, PSYOPs may have the added benefit boosting the morale of one's own troops as well as amongst resistance groups behind enemy lines.

Public Diplomacy

More generally, public diplomacy involves the attempt to influence foreign publics without the use of force. The now-defunct U.S. Information Agency defined public diplomacy as "promoting the national interest and the national security of the United States through understanding, informing, and influencing foreign publics and broadening dialogue between American citizens and institutions and their counterparts abroad."[15] The areas of public diplomacy used to influence foreign target audiences are media diplomacy, public information, internal broadcasting, education and cultural programs, and political action. The idea of public diplomacy emerged from the Office of War Information, which existed during WWII. During the early part of the Cold War, a succession of offices within the U.S. Department of State had responsibility for the dissemination of information abroad. During the Eisenhower Administration, an independent agency was created for the purpose. The agency was later abolished by President Carter and its functions folded into the newly created International Communication Agency (ICA) in 1978 (later redesignated US Information Agency, or USIA, in 1982 during the Reagan Administration). In the 1990s, USIA and the Voice of America (VOA) were incorporated back into the State Department. Most recently, the White House established its own Office of Global Communications in 2001 to formulate and coordinate messages to foreign audiences. Other significant agencies include the International Broadcasting Bureau and the National Endowment for Democracy.

One observer has suggested a list of best practices in the conduct of public diplomacy, at least from the perspective of the United States.[16]

• First, the primary goal is policy advocacy, in other words, to ensure that foreign publics understand US policies and motivations. As such, public diplomacy must be incorporated into foreign policy and it should involve coordination amongst a number of government agencies.
• Second, public diplomacy must be rooted in American culture and values.
• Third, the messages conveyed need to be consistent, truthful, and credible.
• Fourth, it is important to tailor messages to a particular audience.
• Fifth, a strategy needs to reach not only to opinion leaders, but also the mass public through national and global media outlets.
• Sixth, there are a number of nonstate actors such as MNCs, the expatriot community, and humanitarian organizations that can serve as partners to help deliver the message accurately.
• Finally, the US needs to recognize public diplomacy is a dialogue and to also listen to sentiment in other countries.

The Internet has become a major tool for information dissemination and interactive communication between the US government and their target populations as well as developing links with civil society actors around the world. Arquilla and Ronfeldt have described the strategy as 'noopolitik' as opposed to state-centered realpolitik . The former involves the use of soft power to shape ideas, values, norms, laws, and ethics.[17]

Cultural and educational programs, such as the Fulbright program, seek to provide a deeper understanding of a country's society, values, institutions and motives for forming the positions it takes. While funding of arts and cultural exchange was a prominent part of the ideological battle between the US and USSR, support has declined since the end of the Cold War.[18]

Propaganda and the War on Terror

The United States' War on Terror is but one of the most recent iterations of the use of propaganda in conflict. Since 9/11, the Bush administration has used fundamentalist discourse dominated by the binaries of good-evil and security-peril as well as appealing to a missionary obligation to spread freedom, while at the same time not broaching dissent.[19] This has had some resonance with segments of the American population. However, in this era of globalization, bad news in Iraq have obstructed the message and it has also been received very differently abroad. The US military has also utilized the practice of embedding journalists, which the British first learned during the Falklands war could be an effective government strategy because it creates sympathy for the troops on the part of the journalist.[20]

Despite gaffs of referring to the War on Terror as a crusade, the administration quickly recognized the importance of shoring up its image around the world, and the Middle East in particular. Within a month of 9/11, Charlotte Beers, a pioneer of branding strategies who had previously led Ogilvy & Mather and J. Walter Thompson, two of the largest advertising firms in the world, was named to the post of Under Secretary for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs. Beers was later replaced by Karen Hughes. Upon Beers' appointment, Secretary of State Colin Powell described her role in these terms: "We are selling a product. There is nothing wrong with getting somebody who knows how to sell something. We need someone who can rebrand American policy"[21] The administration did just that, undertaking a "brand America" campaign in the Middle East. Amongst Beers' initiatives were a glossy brochure depicting the carnage of 9/11 and the "Shared Values" campaign that consisted of a series of short videos of Muslims describing their lives in the US. The latter portrayed an American egalitarian culture, that the US was wronged and a victim. The videos showed successful Muslims. They tried to enhance their authenticity by showing Muslims doing 'traditional' things. The US made a particularly concerted effort to reach young Arabs. Many argue that the use of public diplomacy can be an important tool to offer desperate youth, particularly in the Arab world, a compelling ideological alternative to extremism.[22] To the present, however, the American propaganda campaign has failed in Iraq on all four of Pratkanis and Aronson's counts.[23] To be effective, some argue for the importance of a greater recognition amongst policymakers and politicians that public diplomacy is a long-term effort. In addition, some have called for a strengthened agency that has independent reporting, an increased budget, as well as greater training.[24] There is also a need for better organization and a better articulation of an overarching strategy in the conduct of public diplomacy.[25]

Political Communication

Propaganda itself is a subcategory of political communication, which encompasses a wide range of communicative behaviors that have political ends. One element encompasses the conduct of an effective election campaign, to disseminate the candidate's message and to counter the message of one's opponents. Governments, too, employ various techniques, including as we have seen propaganda, to build support for policies and stifle dissent. Chomsky and Herman's propaganda model of the media[26] "depicts the media system as having a series of five successive filters through which the "raw material of news" must pass, leaving a "cleansed residue" of what "news is fit to print, marginaliz[ing] dissent, and allow[ing] the government and dominant private interests to get their messages across to the public." In brief paraphrase, these filters are (a) a focus on profitability by an increasingly concentrated industry that has close ties to the government and is in a position by sheer volume to overwhelm dissenting media voices, (b) the dependence of these media organizations on funding through advertising, leading them to favor content likely to appeal to the affluent and making concessions to commercial sponsors, (c) the dependence of journalists who work for the media on information from sources that constitute, collectively, a powerful and prestigious establishment; (d) commercial interests that make the media vulnerable to "flak" and criticism from groups and institutions with the power to generate criticism and protest to which they respond with caution; and, finally, (e) "anticommunism" (or some ideological equivalent) that those who produce content have internalized, thus conjoining them to frame the news in a dichotomous fashion, applying one standard to those on "our" side and a quite different one to "enemies." Most recently, the "war against terrorism" has served as a non-ideological substitute…. The propaganda model assigns to the media system just one major function to which everything else is subordinate. That function is the "manufacture of consent" for government policies that advance the goals of corporations and preserve the capitalist system."[27]

Some argue that evolving communications technologies and advertising and marketing techniques are damaging democratic practice by replacing thoughtful discussion with simplistic soundbites and manipulative messages.[28] Campaigns play on our deepest fears and most irrational hopes with the result being that we have a skewed view of the world. That said, media effects on politics are not uniform around the world. Rather, they are the product of the types of media technologies, the structure of the media market, the legal and regulatory framework, the nature of political institutions, and the characteristics of individual citizens.[29] What is more, others argue, by contrast, that "blaming the messenger" overlooks deep-rooted flaws in the systems of representative democracy that are responsible for the sorry condition of political discussion.[30] There is also much discussion about whether the internet is a positive for American democracy.[31] With respect to often delicate peace processes, the role of the media in the Rwandan genocide has given the news media a tarnished reputation. However, in some instances, the news media has sometimes played a constructive role in sustaining peace efforts.[32]

[1] Lippmann, W. A Preface to Morals . New York: Macmillan, 1929. 281.

[2] Guilday, Peter. "The Sacred Congregation De Propaganda Fide." Catholic Historical Review 6. 480. See also: Jowett, Garth S. and Victoria O'Donnell. Propaganda and Persuasion . 3rd ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, 1999. 72-73.

[3] Combs, J.E. and D. Nimmo. The New Propaganda: The Dictatorship of Palaver in Contemporary Politics . New York: Longman, 1993.

[4] Kimble, James J. "Whither Propaganda? Agonism and 'The Engineering of Consent'." Quarterly Journal of Speech 91.2 (May 2005).

[5] Link, Jurgen. "Fanatics, Fundamentalists, Lunatics, and Drug Traffickers: The New Southern Enemy Image." Cultural Critique 19 (Fall 1991): 33-53.

[6] Kimble, 203.

[7] Jowett, Garth S. and Victoria O'Donnell. Propaganda and Persuasion . 4th ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, 2006.

[8] For further discussion, see: Center for Media and Democracy. "Propaganda Techniques." < http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Propaganda-techniques> .

[9] Horten, Gerd. Radio Goes to War: The Cultural Politics of Propaganda During World War II . Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2002.

[10] Cunningham, S.B. The Idea of Propaganda: A Reconstruction . Westport, CT: Praeger, 2002.; Ellul, J. "The Ethics of Propaganda: Propaganda, Innocence and Amorality." Communication 6 (1981): 159-175.; Plaisance, Patrick Lee. 2005. "The Propaganda War on Terrorism: An Analysis of the United States' 'Shared Values' Public-Diplomacy Campaign After September 11, 2001." Journal of Mass Media Ethics 20.4 (2005): 250-268.

[11] Pratkanis, Anthony and Elliot Aronson. Age of Propaganda: The Everyday Use and Abuse of Persuasion . Owl Books, 2001.

[12] Deibert, R. "International Plug 'n' Play: Citizen Activism, the Internet and Global Public Policy." International Studies Perspectives 1.3 (2000): 255-272.; Rothkopf, D. "The Disinformation Age." Foreign Policy 114 (1999): 82-96.; Volkmer, I. News in the Global Sphere . Luton: University of Luton Press, 1999.

[13] Hoskins, Andrew. Televising War: From Vietnam to Iraq . London and New York: Continuum, 2004.

[14] Jowett and O'Donnell (2006), 270.

[15] U.S. Information Agency Alumni Association. "What is Public Diplomacy?" 1 Sep 2002. 2 Apr 2003. < http://www.publicdiplomacy.org/1.htm> .

[16] Ross, Christopher. "Pillars of Public Diplomacy." Harvard Review Aug 2003. Available at: < http://www.iwar.org.uk/news-archive/2003/08-21-3.htm> .

[17] Arquilla, J. and D. Ronfeldt. The Emergence of Noopolitik: Toward an American Information Strategy . Santa Monica, CA: Rand, 1999. w13. < http://www.rand.org/publications/MR/MR 1033/ MR1033.pdf/MR1033.chap3.pdf>.

[18] Smith, Pamela. "What Is Public Diplomacy?" Address before the Mediterranean Academy of Diplomacy, Malta, 2000. < http://diplo.diplomacy.edu/Books/mdiplomacy-book/smith/p.h.%20smith.htm> .

[19] Domke, David. God Willing? Political Fundamentalism In The White House, The War On Terror And The Echoing Press . London: Pluto Press, 2004.

[20] Knightley, Philip. The First Casualty: The War Correspondent as Hero, Propagandist and Myth-maker from the Crimea to Iraq . London: André Deutsch, 2003.; Miller, David (ed.) Tell Me Lies: Propaganda and Media Distortion in the Attack on Iraq . London and Sterling, VA: Pluto Press, 2004.

[21] Klein, N. "The Problem is the U.S. Product." Seattle Post-Intelligencer 28 Jan 2003: B5.

[22] Finn, Helena K. "The Case for Cultural Diplomacy: Engaging Foreign Audiences." Foreign Affairs 82.6 (Nov-Dec 2003): 15.

[23] McKay, Floyd. "Propaganda: America's Psychological Warriors." The Seattle Times , 19 Feb 2006. < http://www.commondreams.org/views06/0219-24.htm> .

[24] Johnson, Stephen and Helle Dale. "How to Reinvigorate U.S. Public Diplomacy." The Heritage Foundation Backgrounder 1645 (23 Apr 2003). < http://www.heritage.org/Research/NationalSecurity/loader.cfm?url=/common... .

[25] GAO Report on Public Diplomacy. 2003. < http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d03951.pdf> .

[26] Herman, Edward S. and Noam Chomsky, Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media . New York: Pantheon, 2002. Excepts of a previous edition available at < http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Herman%20/Manufac-Consent-Prop-Model.h... .

[27] Lang, Kurt and Gladys Engel Lang. "Noam Chomsky and the Manufacture of Consent for American Foreign Policy." Political Communication 21.93 (2004): 94.

[28] Bennett, W. Lance and Robert Entman (eds.) 2000. Mediated Politics: Communication in the Future of Democracy . Cambridge University Press, 2000.; Pratkanis, Anthony and Elliot Aronson. Age of Propaganda: The Everyday Use and Abuse of Persuasion . Owl Books, 2001.

[29] Gunther, Richard and Anthony Mughan (eds.) Democracy and the Media . Cambridge University Press, 2000.; Hallin, Daniel C. and Paolo Mancini. Comparing Media Systems: Three Models of Media and Politics . Cambridge University Press, 2004.

[30] Norris, Pippa. A Virtuous Circle: Political Communications in Post-Industrial Democracies . Cambridge University Press, 2000.

[31] Bimber, Bruce. Information and American Democracy: Technology in the Evolution of Political Power . Cambridge University Press, 2003.

[32] Wolfsfeld, Gadi. Media and the Path to Peace . Cambridge University Press, 2004.

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Definition and Examples of Propaganda

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• Ph.D., Rhetoric and English, University of Georgia
• M.A., Modern English and American Literature, University of Leicester
• B.A., English, State University of New York

Propaganda is a form of psychological warfare that involves the spreading of information and ideas to advance a cause or discredit an opposing cause. 

In their book Propaganda and Persuasion (2011), Garth S. Jowett and Victoria O'Donnell define propaganda as "the deliberate and systematic attempt to shape perceptions, manipulate cognitions, and direct behavior to achieve a response that furthers the desired intent of the propagandist."

Pronunciation: prop-eh-GAN-da

Etymology: from the Latin, "to propagate"

Examples and Observations

• "Every day we are bombarded with one persuasive communication after another. These appeals persuade not through the give-and-take of argument and debate but through the manipulation of symbols and of our most basic human emotions. For better or worse, ours is an age of propaganda." (Anthony Pratkanis and Elliot Aronson, Age of Propaganda: The Everyday Use and Abuse of Persuasion , rev. ed. Owl Books, 2002)

Rhetoric and Propaganda

• "Rhetoric and propaganda, both in popular and academic commentary, are widely viewed as interchangeable forms of communication; and historical treatments of propaganda often include classical rhetoric (and sophistry ) as early forms or antecedents of modern propaganda (e.g., Jowett and O'Donnell, 1992. pp. 27-31)." (Stanley B. Cunningham, The Idea of Propaganda: A Reconstruction . Praeger, 2002)
• "Throughout the history of rhetoric, . . . critics have deliberately drawn distinctions between rhetoric and propaganda. On the other hand, evidence of the conflation of rhetoric and propaganda, under the general notion of persuasion, has become increasingly obvious, especially in the classroom, where students seem incapable of differentiating among the suasory forms of communication pervasive now in our heavily mediated society. . . .
• "In a society where the system of government is based, at least in part, on the full, robust, give-and-take of persuasion in the context of debate, this conflation is deeply troubling. To the extent that all persuasive activity was lumped together with 'propaganda' and given the 'evil connotation ' (Hummel & Huntress 1949, p. 1) the label carried, persuasive speech (i.e. rhetoric) would never hold the central place in education or democratic civic life it was designed to." (Beth S. Bennett and Sean Patrick O'Rourke, "A Prolegomenon to the Future Study of Rhetoric and Propaganda." Readings in Propaganda and Persuasion: New and Classic Essays , ed by Garth S. Jowett and Victoria O'Donnell. Sage, 2006)

Examples of Propaganda

• "A massive propaganda campaign by the South Korean military drew an ominous warning from North Korea on Sunday, with Pyongyang saying that it would fire across the border at anyone sending helium balloons carrying anti-North Korean messages into the country. "A statement carried by the North’s official news agency said the balloon-and-leaflet campaign 'by the puppet military in the frontline area is a treacherous deed and a wanton challenge' to peace on the Korean Peninsula." (Mark McDonald, "N. Korea Threatens South on Balloon Propaganda." The New York Times , Feb. 27, 2011)
• "The US military is developing software that will let it secretly manipulate social media sites by using fake online personas to influence internet conversations and spread pro-American propaganda.
• "A Californian corporation has been awarded a contract with United States Central Command (Centcom), which oversees US armed operations in the Middle East and Central Asia, to develop what is described as an 'online persona management service' that will allow one US serviceman or woman to control up to 10 separate identities based all over the world." (Nick Fielding and Ian Cobain, "Revealed: US Spy Operation That Manipulates Social Media." The Guardian , March 17, 2011)

ISIS Propaganda

• "Former US public diplomacy officials fear the sophisticated, social media-borne propaganda of the Islamic State militant group (Isis) is outmatching American efforts at countering it.
• "Isis propaganda runs the gamut from the gruesome video-recorded beheadings of journalists James Foley and Steven Sotloff to Instagram photographs of cats with AK-47s, indicating a comfort Isis has with internet culture. A common theme, shown in euphoric images uploaded to YouTube of jihadi fighters parading in armored US-made vehicles captured from the Iraqi military, is Isis’s potency and success. . . .
• "Online, the most visible US attempt to counter to Isis comes from a social media campaign called Think Again Turn Away, run by a State Department office called the Center for Strategic Counterterrorism Communications." (Spencer Ackerman, "Isis's Online Propaganda Outpacing US Counter-Efforts." The Guardian , September 22, 2014)

The Aims of Propaganda

• "The characteristic that propaganda is a form of mass media argumentation should not, in itself, be regarded as sufficient for drawing the conclusion that all propaganda is irrational or illogical or that any argument used in propaganda is for that reason alone fallacious. . . .
• "[T]he aim of propaganda is not just to secure a respondent's assent to a proposition by persuading him that it is true or that it is supported by propositions he is already committed to. The aim of propaganda is to get the respondent to act, to adopt a certain course of action, or to go along with and assist in a particular policy. Merely securing assent or commitment to a proposition is not enough to make propaganda successful in securing its aim." (Douglas N. Walton, Media Argumentation: Dialectic, Persuasion, and Rhetoric . Cambridge University Press, 2007)

Recognizing Propaganda

• "The only truly serious attitude . . . is to show people the extreme effectiveness of the weapon used against them, to rouse them to defend themselves by making them aware of their frailty and their vulnerability instead of soothing them with the worst illusion, that of a security that neither man's nature nor the techniques of propaganda permit him to possess. It is merely convenient to realize that the side of freedom and truth for man has not yet lost, but that it may well lose--and that in this game, propaganda is undoubtedly the most formidable power, acting in only one direction (toward the destruction of truth and freedom), no matter what the good intentions or the goodwill may be of those who manipulate it." (Jacques Ellul, Propaganda: The Formation of Men's Attitudes . Vintage Books, 1973)
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How Does Propaganda Work?

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Daniel B. Block, MD, is an award-winning, board-certified psychiatrist who operates a private practice in Pennsylvania.

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• How to Avoid Being Manipulated

Propaganda is a type of communication that often involves sharing biased or misleading information to promote a particular agenda or point of view. Propaganda is used to influence people's opinions or control their behavior through various tactics such as name-calling, bandwagoning, or inciting fear.

Here we explore the goals of a propagandist and in what types of situations it is typically used. We also discuss the potential effects of propaganda, along with some steps we can take to keep from being influenced by skewed or false information.

Propaganda can be very effective in influencing people's opinions. For this reason, it is important to be aware of the techniques that are used to avoid being manipulated.

What Are the Goals of a Propagandist?

People use propaganda to promote a particular agenda or point of view. The goals of propaganda can vary, but commonly include:

• Shaping people's opinions so they think a particular way
• Convincing people to support a specific cause or political candidate
• Encouraging people to behave in a certain way

How Propaganda Is Used

Propaganda can be used in a variety of ways. Among the settings it is typically seen include the media, advertising, war, and politics.

Propaganda In Media

Mass media is often used by propagandists to sway societies or large groups of people to think a certain way. One example of propaganda in media is the film "Triumph of the Will."

This 1935 film was made to promote the Nazi regime and to encourage people to support Adolf Hitler using fragments of truth combined with certain images chosen to influence social memory. It is considered to be one of the most effective propaganda films ever made.

Propaganda In Advertising

Advertisers use persuasive techniques to try to convince people to buy their products. One example of propaganda in advertising is the use of fear tactics. Advertisers may try to convince people that they need a certain product to avoid a negative outcome.

Another common technique is the use of bandwagoning. The bandwagon effect involves advertisers trying to convince consumers that everyone is using a certain product and that they should too.

Propaganda In War

Propaganda is often used in war. It can be used to make people support the war effort or to discourage them from supporting the enemy.

War propaganda often relies on misinformation and name-calling or the use of derogatory terms to achieve its goals. For example, in World War II, the Nazis referred to the Jews as "rats" and, during the Islamic Revolution, Ayatolla Hlomeini referred to the United States as the "Great Satan."

Propaganda In Politics

Propaganda is often used in politics to influence people's opinions about a particular political candidate or issue. Political propaganda can take many forms, but it often relies on emotional appeals, name-calling, and scare tactics.

One example of political propaganda was the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth ads used to attack John Kerry during the 2004 presidential election. Another occurred in the 2008 presidential campaign when propaganda was used to claim that then-candidate Barack Obama was Muslim.

Effects of Propaganda

Propaganda can be dangerous because it often uses partial truths or biased misinformation to shape people's opinions and control their behaviors. Presenting only some of the information or skewing it in one direction fails to provide a complete and accurate picture for people to consider when deciding their opinions and behaviors.

Other negative effects of propaganda include:

• Spreading hatred and bigotry
• Inciting violence
• Undermining democracy

In addition to affecting a person's beliefs and attitudes, propaganda also has the ability to impact their emotions and mood.

Propaganda Techniques

People can use a variety of techniques to spread propaganda. Here are some of the most common:

• Name-calling: Name-calling involves using derogatory terms to describe an opponent or enemy.
• Appealing to emotions: Propaganda often relies on emotional appeals to influence people's opinions. For example, propaganda might incite fear or create anger to get people to support a particular cause.
• Bandwagoning: Bandwagoning is a technique that uses peer pressure to convince people to do something. For example, a political candidate might say, "Everyone is voting for me, so you should too."
• Scare tactics: Scare tactics are used to frighten people into supporting a particular cause. For example, a campaign might warn people that if they don't vote, a dangerous criminal will be elected.
• Manipulating Information: Manipulating information involves distorting or misrepresenting the facts to influence people's opinions. For example, a political campaign might make false claims about an opponent to make them look bad.
• Using false statistics: Using false or misleading statistics is a common propaganda technique. For example, a campaign might claim that most people support their candidate, even if this is not true.
• Making unrealistic promises: Making unrealistic promises is another common technique used in propaganda. For example, a candidate might promise to end poverty, even though this is not possible.
• Using symbols: Symbols are often used in propaganda to represent an idea or concept. For example, in 1920, the Nazi party used the swastika to represent its belief in racial purity.
• Slogans: Slogans are short catchphrases used to summarize an idea or concept. For example, in the 2016 presidential campaign, "Make America Great Again" was one of Donald Trump's slogans.
• Plain folks: The plain folks' appeal is a technique that uses average, everyday people to endorse a product or candidate. The idea is that if regular people like something, then it must be good. For example, a political campaign might use ordinary citizens in its commercials to try to appeal to voters.
• Testimonials: Testimonials are endorsements from famous or respected people. For example, a celebrity might endorse a candidate for office, or a doctor might endorse a new medication.
• Transfer: This technique uses positive associations to make an object or person seem more favorable. For example, a political campaign might use the American flag in its ads to make the candidate seem patriotic.
• Card stacking: Card stacking is a technique that only presents information that is favorable to the person or thing being promoted. For example, a company might only show the positive reviews of its product and not the negative ones.
• Glittering generalities: Glittering generalities are words or phrases that have a positive connotation but don't really mean anything. For example, a candidate might say they are "for change," even though they don't specify what kind of change they are for.
• Stereotyping: Stereotyping is a technique that uses oversimplified and often inaccurate ideas or beliefs to describe an opponent or enemy.
• Snob appeal: Snob appeal is a technique that uses the idea of exclusivity to make something seem more desirable. For example, a luxury car company might use the slogan, "Only the best for you."
• Loaded language: This technique uses language to evoke certain emotions or feelings. For example, the phrase "pro-life" is loaded with emotional and moral weight.
• Weasel words: Weasel words are words designed to mislead or deceive people. For example, the phrase, "I'm not saying that X is a bad person, but..." implies that the person is bad without actually saying it.

Tips to Avoid Being Manipulated by Propaganda

One of the best ways to not fall for propaganda is to educate ourselves about the techniques that are used. By being aware of the ways that information can be distorted, we can more easily see through the manipulation and make our own informed decisions.

It's also important to critically evaluate the information that we receive. Seek out multiple sources to verify facts before making any decisions, and don't blindly trust emotional appeals or information presented. Instead, we need to take the initiative to learn if the information provided is accurate before developing our beliefs or changing our behaviors.

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Raza Rizvi W. Politics, propaganda and film form: Battleship Potemkin and Triumph of the Will . In: The London Film and Media Reader 3: The Pleasures of the Spectacle, London: The London Symposium . 2015:588-598.

Rai TS, Valdesolo P, Graham J. Dehumanization increases instrumental violence, but not moral violence .  Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A . 2017;114(32):8511-8516. doi:10.1073/pnas.1705238114

Rezaei F. Iran and the United States: The rise and fall of the brief detente . Iran's Foreign Policy After the Nuclear Agreement . 2018:21-50. doi:10.1007/978-3-319-76789-5_2

Vaccari C, Morini M. The powers of smears in two American presidential campaigns . J Political Market . 2014;13(1-2):19-45. doi:10.1080/15377857.2014.866021

Quaranto A, Stanley J. Propaganda . In: The Routledge Handbook of Social and Political Philosophy of Language . 2021:125-146.

Holocaust Encyclopedia. The history of the swastika .

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By Arlin Cuncic, MA Arlin Cuncic, MA, is the author of The Anxiety Workbook and founder of the website About Social Anxiety. She has a Master's degree in clinical psychology.

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World War II: Posters and Propaganda

By tim bailey, unit objective.

This unit is part of Gilder Lehrman’s series of Common Core State Standards–based teaching resources. These units were written to enable students to understand, summarize, and analyze original texts of historical significance. The lessons are built around the use of textual and visual evidence and critical thinking skills.

Over the course of three lessons the students will analyze a secondary source document and primary source documents in the form of propaganda posters produced to support the United States war effort during World War II. These period posters represent the desire of the government to gain support for the war by shaping public opinion. Students will closely analyze both the primary source artwork and the secondary source essay with the purpose of not only understanding the literal meaning but also inferring the more subtle messages. Students will use textual and visual evidence to draw their conclusions and present arguments as directed in each lesson.

In this lesson the students will carefully analyze an essay that discusses both the purpose and the impact of World War II posters on the American war effort on the home front. This essay will give the students background knowledge that will make close analysis of the actual posters more effective over the next two lessons. A graphic organizer will be used to help facilitate and demonstrate their understanding of the essay.

Introduction

With the attack by Japan on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, the United States found itself suddenly involved in a war that was raging across nearly every continent of the globe. As the American military ramped up its war effort, support from the American public became crucial. The need for more soldiers, more factory production, more government funds, and less consumption by civilians of crucial war resources led to a public propaganda campaign. In an age before the widespread use of television the two best ways to reach the public were radio broadcasts and print. President Roosevelt was a pioneer in using the radio to sway public opinion, and soon colorful posters promoting the requirements of the war effort began appearing all over the United States.

• "Every Citizen a Soldier: World War II Posters on the American Home Front," by William L. Bird Jr. and Harry Rubenstein (abridged from The Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History website; complete essay is here )
• Graphic Organizer: Every Citizen a Soldier: World War II Posters on the American Home Front

At the teacher’s discretion you may choose to have the students do the lesson individually, as partners, or in small groups of no more than three or four students.

• Hand out "Every Citizen a Soldier: World War II Posters on the American Home Front," by William L. Bird Jr. and Harry Rubenstein.
• "Share read" the essay with the students. This is done by having the students follow along silently while the teacher begins reading aloud. The teacher models prosody, inflection, and punctuation. The teacher then asks the class to join in with the reading after a few sentences while the teacher continues to read along with the students, still serving as the model for the class. This technique will support struggling readers as well as English language learners (ELL).
• Hand out Graphic Organizer Lesson 1: Every Citizen a Soldier: World War II Posters on the American Home Front.
• Using the graphic organizer, the students analyze the secondary source document. This can be done as a whole-class activity with discussion, in small groups, with partners, or individually.
• Discuss different interpretations developed by the students or student groups.

In this lesson the students will carefully analyze ten primary source posters from World War II. These posters come from a variety of sources but all of them reflect the themes developed by the United States government and the Office of War Information (OWI). These themes were introduced in the essay used in lesson one. The students will determine which of the six themes recommended by the OWI the poster best represents. They will use the visual evidence as well as the textual evidence to analyze the theme presented in the poster. A poster analysis sheet will be used to demonstrate their understanding.

The development of posters to promote American patriotism during World War II is an example of propaganda. Propaganda is a form of communication that usually bypasses the intellect and motivates a target group by appealing to their emotions. The posters developed for the home front during World War II were designed to motivate American citizens and develop a sense of patriotism that would turn the United States into an unstoppable war machine. These posters called on all Americans to be part of the war effort, not just by carrying a gun into battle, but in many other important ways. Government programs such as metal and rubber drives may not have meant the difference between winning or losing the war, but the camaraderie and sense of unity generated by such drives was very important to the war effort.

• World War II Posters #1–#10
• Analyzing the Poster  (each student or group will need five copies)
• Hand out World War II Posters #1–#2 and Analyzing the Poster
• The students answer the questions on the Analyzing the Poster handouts for each poster. For the first two posters this will be done as a whole-class activity with discussion. After analyzing the first two posters with the class, hand out posters #3–#10. These posters will be analyzed by the students in small groups, with a partner, or individually.
• Discuss different interpretations developed by the students or student groups. Discuss the information in the introduction.

In this lesson the students will carefully analyze ten primary source posters from World War II. The students will determine which of the six themes recommended by the Office of War Information the poster best represents. The students will use the visual evidence, as well as the textual evidence, in order to analyze the theme presented in each poster. A poster analysis sheet will be used to demonstrate their understanding. In addition, the students will synthesize, analyze, and present an argument about what they have learned in a short essay.

In 1942 President Franklin Roosevelt created the Office of War Information to distribute and control pro-American propaganda during World War II. To accomplish this goal the Office of War Information recruited Hollywood movie studios, radio stations, and the print media. In a general sense, the goal of this effort was to promote hatred for the enemy, support for America’s allies, and a greater support for the war by the American public through increased production, victory gardens, scrap drives, and the buying of US War Bonds. Of all the propaganda produced during the war, the posters had the widest national reach, with more than 200,000 different types produced during the war.

• World War II Posters #11–#20
• World War II Posters and Propaganda Essay Form

At the teacher’s discretion you may choose to have the students do the lesson individually, as partners, or in small groups of no more than three or four students.  

• Hand out World War II Posters #11–#20 and Analyzing the Poster.
• The students analyze the posters and answer the questions on the worksheet.
• Discuss different interpretations developed by the students or student groups and the information in the introduction.
• Hand out the essay form. Students will answer the prompt in a short argumentative essay that uses what they have learned from their analysis of the posters. This assignment should be done individually.

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6 Positive Propaganda and the Pragmatics of Protest

• Published: October 2021
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This chapter examines what protest is from a pragmatic point of view and how it relates to propaganda—specifically what Jason Stanley calls “positive propaganda.” It analyzes the phrase “Black lives matter,” taking it to be a political speech act that offers a unique route to understanding the pragmatics of protest. From this, it considers the moral-epistemological function of protest and develops an account of the authority that protest, as a speech act, both calls upon and makes explicit. It then argues that, rather than simply its effects, it is protest’s distinct pragmatic features—that is, its entitlement conditions and the uptake it aims at—that best capture its important moral, political, and epistemic elements. It therefore rejects the idea that protests are paradigmatic examples of “positive propaganda,” because the propaganda model cannot capture protests’ function of foregrounding the socially located moral authority of the protestor.

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Home — Essay Samples — Sociology — Propaganda — Propaganda in War

Propaganda in War

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Published: Jul 17, 2018

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Special Issue: Propaganda

This essay was published as part of the Special Issue “Propaganda Analysis Revisited”, guest-edited by Dr. A. J. Bauer (Assistant Professor, Department of Journalism and Creative Media, University of Alabama) and Dr. Anthony Nadler (Associate Professor, Department of Communication and Media Studies, Ursinus College).

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Overlooking the political economy in the research on propaganda

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Historically, scholars studying propaganda have focused on its psychological and behavioral impacts on audiences. This tradition has roots in the unique historical trajectory of the United States through the 20th century. This article argues that this tradition is quite inadequate to tackle propaganda-related issues in the Global South, where a deep understanding of the political economy of propaganda and misinformation is urgently needed.

School of Journalism and Mass Communication, University of Wisconsin-Madison, USA

Research Questions

• What is the dominant approach to studying online propaganda in the context of the Global South?
• What are the limitations of this approach?

Essay Summary

• During the 20th century, funding from the U.S. government and corporate entities oriented the field of mass communication towards studying psychological and behavioral impacts of media on audiences because such research was beneficial to these funders. This orientation is the dominant paradigm in the field. 
• A bulk of research on misinformation and propaganda since 2016 is situated in this intellectual legacy. 
• A thematic meta-analysis – of recent literature on online propaganda in the context of the Global South, and 20 Facebook-funded research projects in 2018 – shows that research is overwhelmingly focused on the psychological and behavioral impacts of propaganda. This research advocates for promoting “media literacy” and helping citizens “inoculate” themselves against propaganda.
• This approach has limited use in tackling propaganda in the Global South. It not only oversimplifies “media literacy,” but also fails to examine, quite crucially, how the state, corporations, and media institutions interact – the political economy of propaganda.
• Further, scholars need to reflect on how entities such as Facebook fund such research to deflect scrutiny of their institutional role in propaganda-related violence in the Global South.

Implications

Researchers studying mass communication, including social media, often focus on the media’s psychological and behavioral impacts on audiences to the detriment of an institution-level study of mass communication. The reason for such an orientation lies in the history of mass communication research in the United States amidst the global wars and social turmoil of the twentieth century. During this period, research agendas took on an “administrative” approach in order to aid those in governments and corporations in using communication channels to better influence their audiences (Lazarsfeld, 1941). 1 Lazarsfeld, a “founding father” of the field, describes the administrative paradigm as “carried through in the service of some kind of administrative agency of public or private character” (Lazarsfeld, 1941, p. 8) with a purpose to “sell goods, or to raise the intellectual standards of the population, or secure an understanding of government policies” (Lazarsfeld, 1941, p. 2).  The administrative research paradigm (henceforth “administrative paradigm”) conceptualizes communication as “a sender sending a message through a channel to affect audiences.” In this linear, mechanical, and mathematical formulation, each of the pieces – “sender,” “message,” “channel,” and “audiences” – are objects of study. “Media effects” research combines these pieces by studying how various types of messages and channels influence audiences. The administrative paradigm is the dominant paradigm within the field.

Although the research outside of the administrative paradigm is vast (as described later in this section), the dominant paradigm overlooks the political economy of communication or an institution-level analysis – how the state and corporate interests influence media institutions and shape “communication.” These priorities have significant implications, especially regarding propaganda in the Global South. For example, scholars have rarely examined Facebook’s institutional role in the genocide in Myanmar. But before describing these implications further, it is useful to briefly historicize the administrative paradigm.

Historicizing the administrative paradigm

Over the course of the twentieth century, support from two entities was crucial to solidify administrative research as the dominant paradigm within communication research in the U.S. – corporate interests such as the Rockefeller Foundation, and the U.S. government (Pooley, 2008). After observing widespread public susceptibility to propaganda during WWI, many prominent scholars in the U.S. envisioned a technocratic or “managed” democracy (Gary, 1999, pp. 15–54; Glander, 2000, pp. 1–37; Sproule, 1997, pp. 54–74). With corporate funding and governmental aid, scholars started conducting media-effects research, which laid the foundations of the modern advertising and public relations industry as well as more sophisticated propaganda efforts by the U.S. government (Pooley, 2008). By WWII, a network of administrative paradigm scholars had emerged which helped mobilize U.S. citizens for the war and countered Nazi propaganda on behalf of the Roosevelt administration (Glander, 2000, pp. 38–55). Prominent paradigm scholars made the utility of media-effects research clear in the statement that “[public] consent will require unprecedented knowledge of the public mind and of the means by which leadership can secure consent” (Gary, 1996, pp. 139–140). The result was a proliferation of media-effects research and the inception of prominent journals such as  Public Opinion Quarterly , funded by the Rockefeller Foundation (Gary, 1996).

The Cold War was momentous in establishing mass communication as a distinct field, with administrative research as its dominant paradigm (Simpson, 1994). As the two global superpowers raced to control the “Third World,” the U.S. government poured in unprecedented funding into media-effects research, which back then was more appropriately called “psychological warfare” research. 2 Over time, terms such as “propaganda” and “psychological warfare” were replaced by more innocuous-sounding words such as “persuasion” even though the underlying research orientation has remained unchanged (Simpson, 1994; Sproule, 1997). In 1952, for example, 96% of the reported funding in communication research was from the U.S. military (Simpson, 1994, p. 52). This research directly shaped U.S. psychological warfare efforts in “Third World” countries such as Iran (Simpson, 1994, p. 56). In addition, the U.S. government’s massive support expanded the aforementioned network of administrative paradigm scholars; helped place these scholars in high academic positions with control over scholarly publishing and rank and tenure decisions; and the establishment of key academic journals (Simpson, 1994, p. 9). 

Turning to the present, the key point is that contemporary research is shaped by this history: which texts are considered “classics,” who the “founding fathers” are, the top academic journals and their research orientations, and the research questions that generations of scholars have deemed important. That is, academic inquiry operates on a terrain shaped by history and contemporary political economy, rather than in a vacuum. 3 This is, of course, not unique to the field of communication, but also psychology, area studies, anthropology, development studies, and social sciences in general. See the “Introduction” in  Universities and Empire  (Simpson ,  1998).  Furthermore, states’ and corporations’ desire to fund administrative research is not just a phenomenon of the past. Rather, it is fundamental to their interests – they want to use mass communication for political campaigns, advertising, etc.; to educate, persuade, manipulate, or control their subjects.

Limitations of current research

It is in this context that propaganda research has boomed since the 2016 U.S. election. The thematic meta-analysis presented in this paper provides evidence of multiple limitations in the bulk of this research in the context of the Global South:

• Theoretical: The research is primarily focused on media-effects – it investigates individuals’ susceptibility to propaganda. 
• Policy: The research largely conceptualizes online platforms as neutral, and therefore the policy recommendations place the burden of responsibility onto individuals – suggesting that governments should conduct “media literacy” campaigns and recommending how to “inoculate” 4 To quote Roozenbeek & van der Linden (2020) from this journal, “inoculation theory” – which has a plethora of literature on it – uses a medical analogy to posit that “preemptively exposing someone to a weakened version of a particular misleading argument prompts a process that is akin to the production of ‘mental antibodies,’ which make it less likely that a person is persuaded by the ‘real’ manipulation later on.” Their research was funded by the U.S. State Department and U.S. Department of Homeland Security (and conducted on U.S. citizens). This article illustrates the historical patterns described in this article quite aptly; see Roozenbeek et al. (2020) for another example.  citizens against propaganda. Entities such as Facebook have generously funded such research when facing scrutiny of their institutional role in propaganda-fueled violence in the Global South. 
• Methodological: The research is methodologically limited by the administrative paradigm; primarily to conducting media-effects experiments and secondarily to doing content analysis 5 The history of content analysis and its relationship with the administrative paradigm is interesting. The U.S. government promoted content analysis within the administrative paradigm during the Cold War so that it can identify propaganda from rival institutions and get insights into those institutions. Interestingly, researchers working for the U.S. government seriously questioned if content analysis can help in making inferences about institutions at all (Simpson, 1994, p. 88; Sproule, 1997, pp. 193–196).  of online propaganda. Largely absent are methodologies such as policy analysis, interviews, ethnographies, historical analysis, etc.
• Geographical: Research is overwhelmingly focused on the Global North.

The following two cases illustrate the alarming situation in the Global South, along with some key institution-level issues therein, which the administrative paradigm is theoretically unequipped to tackle. In Myanmar, the UN fact-finding mission declared that Facebook played a “determining role” in the Rohingya genocide leading to the exodus of more than 800,000 Rohingya Muslims and a massive humanitarian crisis in South Asia (Miles, 2018). But the key issue of Facebook’s institutional role is rarely examined by communication scholars (some scholarship breaks this trend; see Fink, 2018; Sablosky, 2021). 

In India, Hindu nationalist propaganda on Facebook and Facebook-owned WhatsApp has led to harassment, hate speech, lynchings, and pogroms against Muslims and lower castes (Muslim Advocates & GPAHE, 2020; Soundararajan et al., 2019). Here, a key dynamic is that India is the largest market for Facebook, 6 328 million and 400 million Indians use Facebook and WhatsApp, respectively (Perrigo, 2020).  and Facebook appears to be reluctant to curb propaganda at the expense of its profits. For instance, to avoid upsetting the ruling Hindu-nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Facebook has allowed hate speech by BJP politicians to remain on its platform in violation of its own policies (Purnell & Horwitz, 2020). It is difficult to expect institutional accountability when BJP-linked people run the Facebook India office (ibid.). 

Suggested interventions

This paper suggests the following interventions. First, the dominance of the administrative paradigm exists alongside a theoretically and methodologically vast and rich literature, which adopts other approaches to studying mass communication in the Global North such as: online content moderation (Gillespie, 2018), regulation of social media companies (Napoli, 2019), propaganda ecosystems (Benkler et al., 2018), the role of algorithms (Caplan & boyd, 2018; Noble, 2018), and the political economy of communication (Hindman, 2008; McChesney, 2015; Pickard, 2019). But it is the dominant paradigm – its theoretical orientation and methodology – that is most frequently applied to study online propaganda in the Global South. Less common are approaches dealing with important questions in the Global South of content moderation and hate speech (Sablosky, 2021), the political economy of the internet (Athique & Parthasarathi, 2020), internet regulation (Parthasarathi & Agarwal, 2020; Rajkhowa, 2015), internet access (Moyo & Munoriyarwa, 2021; Mukherjee, 2019; Nothias, 2020), and theorizations of what “fake news” might mean in the Global South (Wasserman, 2020). Scholars need to fill these gaps urgently.

Second, “media literacy” in the context of the Global South needs to be defined with a democratic ethos. There is a tendency in existing research to persistently connect individuals’ characteristics (education, income, identity etc.) to their susceptibility to online propaganda. This tendency extends the discipline’s described historic legacy of facilitating imperialism and statist–corporatist control. Instead, scholars need to explore how individuals can be empowered to participate democratically in policymaking on these issues (Hasebrink, 2012; 7 Also see the entire corresponding special issue of  Medijske Studije. Horowitz & Napoli, 2014). 

Third, scholars need to be cognizant of the political economy of knowledge production – how institutions such as Facebook promote administrative research which takes scholarly attention away from Facebook’s institutional role in propaganda-related violence. 8 As explained earlier, this is part of a larger historic trend. Another example is the Rockefeller Foundation awarding a $67,000 grant in 1937 to study media-effects in the U.S. – the grant came during the formative period for the discipline, and explicitly forbade research on questions of the political economy of communication (Pooley, 2008, p. 51). The prevalence of a research paradigm need not be in proportion to its normative value or theoretical sophistication.

Finding 1: Agendas of research projects funded by Facebook-owned WhatsApp to study misinformation.

In July 2018, Facebook-owned WhatsApp came under heavy scrutiny globally after a series of WhatsApp-fueled lynchings occurred in India (Gowen, 2018). WhatsApp responded with a massive public relations campaign – on radio, television, print media, and the internet – projecting WhatsApp/Facebook as a neutral actor that was committed to helping the community fight misinformation (Creech, 2020; Indo-Asian News Service, 2018; The Indian Express, 2018). Further, WhatsApp invited proposals for “WhatsApp Research Awards for Social Science and Misinformation,” which was widely publicized in the news media. In November 2018, WhatsApp awarded $50,000 to 20 research proposals, totaling $1 million. 

A thematic meta-analysis was done to understand the research focus of this $1 million grant using: (1) WhatsApp’s definitions of “high priority” areas 9 The initial announcement included a category called “Detecting problematic behavior within encrypted systems,” but no research awards were given under it. This category was defined as “Examine technical solutions to detecting problematic behavior within the restrictions of and in keeping with the principles of encryption.” under which it invited proposals, and thereby outlined research agenda(s); (2) The abstracts of all 20 accepted proposals (and every proposal’s stated “high priority” area) from which the more specific research and geographic focus of individual proposals could be ascertained.

Overall, the geographic focus is encouraging; 75% of proposals are on the Global South. However, each “high priority” area (listed below) and the proposals therein are confined to the administrative paradigm:

• Information processing of problematic content: WhatsApp defined this as examining how “social, cognitive, and information processing variables relate to the content’s credibility, and the decision to share that content with others;” that is, media-effects research. For example, one study will compare how users react to fake news in various formats (text-only, audio-only, and video) in India.
• Election-related misinformation: Proposals under this category predominantly undertake media-effects research but emphasize electoral politics. For example, studies will focus on how users get impacted by political information, how they have political conversations, etc.
• Digital literacy and misinformation: WhatsApp defines this as “the relation between digital literacy and vulnerability to misinformation on WhatsApp.” Although this is media-effects research, the focus is more on application (literacy) rather than on advancing theory. One study will examine “how vulnerability to fake news is affected by socioeconomic, demographic, or geographical factors” across nine states in India. Another will test the effectiveness of a game-based intervention to “inoculate” WhatsApp users against fake news.
• Network effects and virality: WhatsApp defined this as “the spread of information through WhatsApp networks.” One study will explore how users process religious information, and another will examine how WhatsApp users and their networks coevolve as misinformation diffuses through the network. 

In sum, when Facebook-owned WhatsApp faced intense scrutiny on its institutional role in propaganda-related violence in the Global South, it responded by funding administrative research – framing the issue as users’ susceptibility to propaganda and lack of media literacy. 

This approach overlooks WhatsApp’s far more complex role in the Global South. For example, “encrypted” platforms such as WhatsApp do not protect everyone equally – while Hindu nationalist groups in India organize violence on WhatsApp with impunity (Purohit, 2019), peaceful protestors are prosecuted (Mahaprashasta, 2020). 10 Although the Indian government and other actors have hacked into WhatsApp in the past, the issue is typically not related to breaking WhatsApp’s encryption – police reports are filed using screenshots of WhatsApp messages, phones are seized, etc. Right-wing authoritarians have leveraged WhatsApp extensively for their political campaigns (Avelar, 2019; Perrigo, 2019; Vaidhyanathan, 2018, pp. 186–195). There is also a larger issue of Facebook pushing its services, such as WhatsApp, without establishing a functional internal infrastructure for handling civil rights issues. 11 Facebook’s failure in this regard is perhaps best documented in the Global North. See Murphy and Cacace (2020). For instance, Facebook makes its website/services cheaper to access compared to other websites in the Global South, 12 This project by Facebook – which violates net neutrality – is called “Internet.org” or “Free Basics,” see Nothias (2020). Recently, Facebook appointed the vice-president of Internet.org to run WhatsApp. which has made Facebook/WhatsApp ubiquitous in countries such as Myanmar (Vaidhyanathan, 2018, pp. 194–195). The issues of internet access, digital literacy, and propaganda are interconnected and need to be studied holistically (Moyo & Munoriyarwa, 2021; Mukherjee, 2019; Nothias, 2020). 

Lastly, the political economy of knowledge production should be noted here. Following a series of WhatsApp-fueled lynchings in India in 2018, Facebook provided $1 million for administrative research. In contrast, when an investigative report in 2020 revealed the collusion between Facebook and India’s Hindu nationalist government (Purnell & Horwitz, 2020), no research grant was awarded to study similar institution-level phenomena in the Global South. Through research funding, Facebook appears to have strategically marginalized the institutional dimensions within these contexts, with obvious consequences for knowledge production.

Finding 2: Agendas of published research on Facebook and WhatsApp.

A thematic meta-analysis of the research published in 10 communication journals with the highest  Journal Impact Factors , shows that the research on Facebook and WhatsApp is limited (Fig. 2):

• Geographically: Out of 590 articles on Facebook, only 4 are on India, and none on Myanmar. This is despite the majority of Facebook users being in the Global South (and India), and despite the genocide in Myanmar – which has been shockingly understudied in comparison to the 2016 U.S. election. A mere 22 articles are on WhatsApp, which has 1.3 billion users located largely in the Global South.
• Theoretically: The highly cited articles are from journals with an administrative research orientation, notably the Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication . The three newer journals –  New Media & Society ;  Information, Communication & Society ; and  Digital Journalism  – however, provide room for non-administrative approaches to studying Facebook and WhatsApp. But overall – keeping with the discipline’s historical legacy – older journals generally adopt the administrative research tradition, and this research is cited the most. 13 7 out of 10 of the most cited articles related to Facebook were from the  Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication.

More extensive reviews and meta-analysis studies of social media research in the past have also noted this geographical disparity as well as the dominance of administrative paradigm theories and methodologies (Caers et al., 2013; Kapoor et al., 2018; Ngai et al., 2015; Zhang & Leung, 2015). Crucially, these reviews and meta-analysis studies do not critique the administrative paradigm; their recommendations for “future directions” of research are almost always confined to the paradigm.

Finding 3: Agendas of published research in Misinformation Review (MR).

A thematic meta-analysis of all the research articles published in this journal, during its first year, shows similar patterns.  MR ’s first issue in January 2020 stated its goal as envisioning a response strategy to deal with misinformation and propaganda, and that “such a strategy requires interventions at many levels: legal, political, financial, infrastructural, cultural, and social” made possible by research on “all aspects of misinformation” (Pasquetto, 2020). However, the published research is limited (Fig. 3):

• Theoretically: Administrative paradigm research constitutes 71% of all articles. The focus is to understand audience behavior via media-effects experiments, surveys, and content analysis of people’s social media posts.
• Methodologically: The tools of administrative research – psychological studies, content analysis, and surveys – are the dominant method in  MR . Even when scholars probe institutions, they mostly conduct content analysis of these institution’s postings on social media. Policy analysis, historical approaches, interviews, ethnographies, etc., are almost completely absent.
• Geographically: Only 19% of the articles are on the Global South.

(A) Agendas of research projects funded by Facebook-owned WhatsApp to study misinformation 

On July 3, 2018, WhatsApp announced the “WhatsApp Research Awards for Social Science and Misinformation.” It announced the 20 winners on September 14, 2018. To assess the research orientation, a thematic meta-analysis was done using:

• Definitions of “high priority” areas obtained from the WhatsApp’s awards launch webpage. 14 See  https://www.whatsapp.com/research/awards/ . Internet Archive link of the same:  https://web.archive.org/web/20180713090830/https://www.whatsapp.com/research/awards/
• The title, abstract, and the stated “high priority” category for the accepted proposals listed on the WhatsApp’s webpage. 15 See  https://www.whatsapp.com/research/awards/announcement/ . Internet Archive link of the same:  https://web.archive.org/web/20190203020712/https://www.whatsapp.com/research/awards/announcement/

The research proposals were categorized by geography – Global North/South – based on the above information (see Appendix I ).

(B) Agendas of published research on Facebook and WhatsApp

First, the list of the top 10 communication journals – by their Journal Impact Factor in 2019 – was obtained from Clarivate Analytics. 16 https://jcr.clarivate.com Second, under “advanced search” on Web of Science: 17 https://apps.webofknowledge.com/

• “Topic” was set to “Facebook,” 
• “Publication name” to the aforementioned 10 journals, 
• “Timespan” to 1900–2020,
• “Document type” to “article.”
• The above steps were repeated with “Topic” set to “WhatsApp.”

These search terms do not restrict results to the Global South or the topic to propaganda; the goal was to assess how these platforms are studied generally. The evidence presented is based on the thematic meta-analysis done with the 30 most-cited articles on Facebook, and all 22 articles on WhatsApp (see Appendix II for the list). Each journal’s featured and highly cited articles, as well as its “aims and scope,” informed the thematic meta-analysis.

(C) Agendas of published research in Misinformation Review (MR)

A thematic meta-analysis of all 31 peer-reviewed research articles published in  MR  during 2020 (excluding the article types “commentary” and “research note”) was done, focusing on these themes:

• Theory: Classified as “administrative research” when focused on understanding audiences, or “institution-level research” when focused on understanding institutional actors (state or non-state). This was determined based on the entirety of the article.
• Methodology: Classified as content analysis, media-effects experiment, or surveys based on methodology described in the article.
• Geography: Classified as Global North or Global South based on the research context or the study’s subjects.

See Appendix III for classifications.

• / Mainstream Media
• / Media Literacy
• / Propaganda

Cite this Essay

Abhishek, A. (2021). Overlooking the political economy in the research on propaganda. Harvard Kennedy School (HKS) Misinformation Review . https://doi.org/10.37016/mr-2020-61

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The author received no specific funding for this work.

Competing Interests

No potential conflicts of interest.

No institutional review board or ethics committee for human or animal experiments review was required.

This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided that the original author and source are properly credited.

Data Availability

All materials needed to replicate this study are available via the Harvard Dataverse: https://doi.org/10.7910/DVN/ZAFIEN , https://doi.org/10.7910/DVN/SRGKQA , https://doi.org/10.7910/DVN/LA2NLZ .

The GOP’s Pro-Russia Caucus Lost. Now Ukraine Has to Win.

Once U.S. money starts flowing again, the dynamics of the war will change.

It’s not too late, because it’s never too late. No outcomes are ever preordained, nothing is ever over, and you can always affect what happens tomorrow by making the right choices today. The U.S. Congress is finally making one of those right choices. Soon, American weapons and ammunition will once again start flowing to Ukraine.

But delays do have a price. By dawdling for so many months, by heading down the blind alley of border reform before turning back, congressional Republicans who blocked weapons and ammunition for Ukraine did an enormous amount of damage, some of it irreparable. Over the past six months, Ukraine lost territory, lives, and infrastructure. If Ukraine had not been deprived of air defense, the city of Kharkiv might still have most of its power plants. People who have died in the near-daily bombardment of Odesa might still be alive. Ukrainian soldiers who spent weeks at the front lines rationing ammunition might not be so demoralized.

David Frum: Trump deflates

The delay has changed American politics too. Only a minority of House Republicans, including Speaker Mike Johnson, joined most Democrats to approve $60 billion in aid yesterday. What is now clearly a pro-Russia Republican caucus has consolidated inside Congress. The lesson is clear: Anyone who seeks to manipulate the foreign policy of the United States, whether the tin-pot autocrat in Hungary or the Communist Party of China, now knows that a carefully designed propaganda campaign, when targeted at the right people, can succeed well beyond what anyone once thought possible. From the first days of the 2022 Russian invasion, President Vladimir Putin has been trying to conquer Ukraine through psychological games as well as military force. He needed to persuade Americans, Europeans, and above all Ukrainians that victory was impossible, that the only alternative was surrender, and that the Ukrainian state would disappear in due course.

Plenty of Americans and Europeans, though not so many Ukrainians, supported this view. Pro-Russia influencers—Tucker Carlson, J. D. Vance, David Sacks—backed up by an army of pro-Russia trolls on X and other social-media platforms, helped feed the narrative of failure and convinced a minority in Congress to block aid for Ukraine. It’s instructive to trace the path of a social-media post that falsely claimed that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky owns two yachts, how it traveled up the food chain late last year, from the keyboard of a propagandist through the echo chamber created by trolls and into the brains of American lawmakers. According to Senator Thom Tillis , a Republican from North Carolina, some of his colleagues worried out loud, during debates about military aid to Ukraine, that “people will buy yachts with this money.” They had read the false stories and believed they were true.

But with the passage of this aid bill, Russia’s demoralization campaign has suffered a severe setback. This is also a setback for the Russian war effort, and not only because the Ukrainians will now have more ammunition. Suddenly the Russian military and Russian society are once again faced with the prospect of a very long war. Ukraine, backed by the combined military and economic forces of the United States and the European Union, is a much different opponent than Ukraine isolated and alone.

Read: The war is not going well for Ukraine

That doesn’t mean that the Russians will quickly give up: Putin and the propagandists who support him on state television have repeatedly stated that their goal is not to gain a bit of extra territory but to control all of Ukraine. They don’t want to swap land for peace. They want to occupy Kharkiv, Odesa, Kyiv, and more. Now, while their goals become harder to reach, is a good moment for the democratic countries backing Ukraine to recalibrate our strategy too.

Once the aid package becomes law this week, the psychological advantage will once again be on our side. Let’s use it. As Johnson himself recommended, the Biden administration should immediately pressure European allies to release the $300 billion in Russian assets that they jointly hold and send it to Ukraine. There are excellent legal and moral arguments for doing so—the money can legitimately be considered a form of reparations. This shift would also make clear to the Kremlin that it has no path back to what used to be called “normal” relations, and that the price Russia is paying for its colonial war will only continue to grow.

This is also a good moment for both Europeans and Americans to take the sanctions and export-control regimes imposed on Russia more seriously. If NATO were running a true economic-pressure campaign, thousands of people would be involved, with banks of screens at a central command center and constantly updated intelligence. Instead, the task has been left to a smattering of people across different agencies in different countries who may or may not be aware of what others are doing.

As American aid resumes, the Ukrainians should be actively encouraged to pursue the asymmetric warfare that they do best. The air and naval drone campaign that pushed the Black Sea Fleet away from their coastline, the raids on Russian gas and oil facilities thousands of miles from Ukraine, the recruitment of Russian soldiers, in Russia, to join pro-Ukraine Russian units fighting on the border—we need more of this, not less. The Biden administration should also heed Johnson’s suggestion that the United States supply more and better long-range weapons so that Ukrainians can hit Russian missile launchers before the missiles reach Ukraine. If the U.S. had done so in the autumn of 2022, when Ukraine was taking back territory, the world might look a lot different today.

This war will be over only when the Russians no longer want to fight—and they will stop fighting when they realize they cannot win. Now it is our turn to convince them, as well as our own pro-Russia caucus, that their invasion will fail. The best way to do that is to believe it ourselves.

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Juggling Campaign and Foreign Policy, Biden Sends Complicated Messages

The president signed a bill that could ban TikTok even as his re-election team uses it to reach young voters. It was hardly the first internal disparity on matters around the globe.

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By Peter Baker

Reporting from Washington

President Biden just signed a bill that could ban President Biden from using TikTok. But Mr. Biden plans to keep using TikTok until Mr. Biden’s new law forces Mr. Biden off it.

His political team in Wilmington, Del., after all, considers TikTok a vital tool to reach young voters who could be crucial to his chances of winning re-election this fall. The problem is that his national security team in Washington considers the Chinese-owned social media site a threat to America that should be banned if it is not sold.

Reconciling those two imperatives left Mr. Biden’s government and campaign advisers laboring on Wednesday to explain the competing rationales. But it is not the only time that Campaign Joe and Foreign Policy Joe have been at odds in recent months. Campaign Joe tells stories on the trail that Foreign Policy Joe’s staff then has to clean up — or try to ignore as best as possible. Campaign Joe prefers blunt talk. Foreign Policy Joe has to worry about diplomacy.

The disconnect is hardly unprecedented in an election year. Every president seeking a second term finds himself juggling two different jobs with two different priorities at the same time: running the country and running for office. A candidate is focused on firing up supporters and tearing down the other side. A commander in chief has to worry about what might be best for the nation even if it is not necessarily best for his electoral chances.

Still, the disparity between Wilmington and Washington has been on display lately . When former President Donald J. Trump hosted Prime Minister Viktor Orban of Hungary at Mar-a-Lago, Mr. Trump’s Florida estate and club, Mr. Biden’s Delaware-based campaign assailed Mr. Orban as “a dictator.” The White House, however, refused to use that term for a NATO ally.

Just last week, Mr. Biden told two campaign audiences that after being shot down during World War II, his uncle might have been eaten by cannibals in Papua New Guinea. Unsurprisingly, that rather peeved the island nation’s leaders at a time when the president has been courting them as part of his Indo-Pacific strategy.

“Like most effective incumbent presidents, President Biden can navigate doing two things at once: being commander in chief, and barnstorming the battlegrounds, taking his popular and historic agenda to the voters who will decide this election,” Kevin Munoz, a campaign spokesman, said in a statement. “It’s a stark contrast to Trump, who couldn’t manage the day job when he was in office and can’t seem to wake up to the fact that he’s running on a deeply toxic agenda that will lose him the election again this November.”

Problematic offhand remarks have long been a challenge for Mr. Biden, who once called himself “a gaffe machine.” Campaigns result in more opportunities to go off script than speaking off a teleprompter in the East Room, so the White House cleanup squad invariably has a surge in business at this point in the electoral cycle.

It was at a campaign fund-raiser last year that Mr. Biden referred to President Xi Jinping of China as “a dictator” — just a day after Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken had met with Mr. Xi in Beijing in an effort to smooth over friction in the U.S.-Chinese relationship. When Mr. Biden was later asked at a news conference if he would still call Mr. Xi a dictator, he said, “Well, look — he is,” and Mr. Blinken, sitting nearby, appeared to wince .

Not that anyone in Washington would privately dispute that Mr. Xi is a dictator. But as a matter of timing, saying it out loud complicated Mr. Blinken’s diplomacy. As it happens, Mr. Blinken seems to have remarkable timing when it comes to these things. Where was the secretary on Wednesday when Mr. Biden signed the TikTok legislation? He had just landed in Beijing for more talks with Chinese leaders.

Mr. Orban is another leader widely considered a dictator in Washington. But because he leads a treaty ally of the United States, official criticism of his policies cracking down on democracy is usually more measured.

Not so when Mr. Orban met with Mr. Trump last month. “Donald Trump is kicking off the general election” by welcoming rogues like “Hungarian dictator Viktor Orban,” the Biden campaign said in an emailed statement. Mr. Biden himself, at a later campaign stop, did not go quite that far but referred to Mr. Orban as someone “looking for dictatorship.”

The statements prompted outrage in Budapest, where Mr. Orban’s government summoned the U.S. ambassador to protest. “We are not obliged to tolerate such lies from anyone, even if that person happens to be the president of the United States of America,” Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto complained at a news conference.

That left Jake Sullivan, the president’s national security adviser, in the awkward position of declining to say whether Mr. Orban is a dictator. “I’m not going to speak on behalf of the Biden campaign,” he told reporters at a briefing . “You should direct those questions to the campaign.” He did express “our deep concerns about Hungary’s assault on democratic institutions.”

Heather A. Conley, the president of the German Marshall Fund of the United States, a research group that promotes democracy, noted that Mr. Orban had injected himself into America’s politics, attending the Conservative Political Action Conference and declaring after his Mar-a-Lago visit that it would be “better for Hungary” if Mr. Trump returned to power.

“Tragically, Hungary has become both a foreign policy and a campaign issue,” she said. Still, she added, calling Mr. Orban a dictator has concrete foreign policy implications. “Should a NATO member, head of state, government be declared a ‘dictator,’ the country would be placed in a special penalty box until the dictatorship is over,” she said, recalling the military junta that took over Greece from 1967 to 1974.

Last week’s presidential cannibal storytelling provoked a backlash of its own. Mr. Biden was talking about his uncle’s death in World War II. “He got shot down in New Guinea, and they never found the body because there used to be — there were a lot of cannibals, for real, in that part of New Guinea,” he said at one stop.

Never mind that the story does not even appear to be true. According to Pentagon records , his uncle, Second Lt. Ambrose J. Finnegan, was a passenger on a military plane that crashed in the Pacific off the northern coast of what was then the territory of New Guinea on May 14, 1944, after its engines failed. Mr. Finnegan and two crew members disappeared and were presumed dead, but the report does not indicate that the plane was shot down, much less that anyone encountered cannibals.

The president’s comments did not go over well in Papua New Guinea, with whom Mr. Biden has been trying to strengthen relations as part of his effort to counter Chinese aggression in the region. “President Biden’s remarks may have been a slip of the tongue; however, my country does not deserve to be labeled as such,” Prime Minister James Marape said.

Gordon Peake, an expert in the region at the United States Institute of Peace, said the flap was a reminder that comments could have unintended consequences. “Papua New Guinea and the wider Pacific, traditionally a bit of a diplomatic backwater for the major powers, is now something of a seller’s market as competition ramps up,” he said. “So words are mattering now more than ever.”

The new TikTok law was part of a $95 billion foreign aid measure to provide arms to Ukraine and Israel for their ongoing wars and to bolster Taiwan against possible Chinese aggression. Under the law, TikTok’s Chinese owner, ByteDance, has to sell within 270 days , or about nine months, or shut down operations in the United States because of concerns over sensitive privacy information and propaganda. The president can extend that deadline to a year.

That means that Mr. Biden’s campaign can continue to use TikTok through the November election. Mr. Sullivan, the national security adviser, declined to say whether the campaign should leave the platform in the meantime. “I’m going to let campaigns decide for themselves what they’re going to do,” he told reporters on Wednesday.

Karine Jean-Pierre, the White House press secretary, emphasized that TikTok did not necessarily face a ban if it could find a buyer. “We want to see a divestment,” she said. “We want to see it being sold, and we do not seek a ban.”

She added that the White House was not urging anyone to leave the platform in the interim. “We’re not saying that we do not want Americans to use TikTok,” she said. “We want to make sure it’s done in a way that we protect our national security and we protect Americans.”

But in fact, the Biden administration has told some Americans not to use TikTok, or at least limited how they use it. Last year, it banned federal employees from having TikTok on their government devices, a rule that applied to federal contractors and any personal devices used for federal work.

The bill that Mr. Biden signed on Wednesday exemplified the conflict between foreign policy and electoral considerations. Not only did he risk alienating millions of young people who use TikTok, but the measure also included billions of dollars in arms for Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza, even though his support for Israel has cost him support among young progressives outraged by the civilian casualty toll.

In his comments on signing the bill, Mr. Biden emphasized that it included money for humanitarian relief in Gaza. But he made no mention of TikTok.

About three hours later, his campaign posted its latest video on TikTok attacking Mr. Trump.

Peter Baker is the chief White House correspondent for The Times. He has covered the last five presidents and sometimes writes analytical pieces that place presidents and their administrations in a larger context and historical framework. More about Peter Baker